We are a tight-knit team with deep backgrounds in science, strategy, and investing. We believe that only by understanding system dynamics, and specific leverage points, can we effectively realize the exponential change in behaviors required to protect our climate. We invest in and support ambitious innovators who can deliver that potential.
Based in Boston, we also love to support the New England innovation and investment ecosystem, as a hub for the technologies that will reduce emissions in the developing world.
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Dwight is a reformed private equity investor, dedicating his investment time to address the existential issues of climate change after 24 years at Bain Capital, where he opened and ran the European private equity business for 18 years. Dwight is a systems thinker with deep experience understanding how markets, businesses and organizations develop, complementing his science and tech savvy partners at AccelR8. Dwight is committed to the New England ecosystem, having earned his BA at Amherst, MBA at Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, was an ALI Fellow at Harvard, and is currently on the boards of the MediaLab and MIT Sloan.
Ryan's career is dedicated to partnering with founders and building companies that commercialize breakthrough science and engineering to address climate change. Before AccelR8, he led investing and innovation teams across the private sector (Autodesk, inst. VC), public sector (US DoD, US GSA), and philanthropy (Prime Coalition). Holding an MBA from MIT and a BS in Civil Engineering from the University of Virginia, Ryan believes the most valuable companies of this generation will be those proving the business case of the climate transition. He is at his best partnering with entrepreneurs to turn that vision into reality.
Louis Kang is an academic turned entrepreneur turned investor with experience across tech, biotech and deeptech. Prior to co-founding and becoming a partner at AccelR8, Louis received his PhD in Applied Physics from Harvard and BS in Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, and Materials Science and Engineering from Berkeley. Given the urgency in addressing climate change, Louis is always on the lookout for partnering with passionate founders working on scalable solutions for greatest impact.
Megan started her career in Equities Trading at Barclays before transitioning to Climate, in which she has worked both in Climate Philanthropy (Founders Pledge) and Climate VC Investing. She has a technical background with scientific expertise in Photovoltaics, Device Physics, and Materials Science. Megan holds a PhD in Materials Science from Caltech and a BS in Physics from Yale. She believes early stage technologies have the potential to shape our future climate, and thus is passionate about identifying and supporting these emerging technologies toward market adoption.
We back founders building great companies at the speed and scale necessary to avert climate tipping points. We look for founders who are:
Problem Solvers: You obsess over customer problems, not just the tech. Your goal is rapid, widespread adoption.
Relentless Builders: You thrive on creating products, closing deals, and cultivating high performing teams. You embrace the hustle.
Visionary Leaders: Your clear and compelling vision inspires others to join and make it a reality.
Adaptive Learners: You fail fast, learn quicker, and constantly push to build a world-class company.
We invest in and build companies that transform physical industries. We back solutions that solve acute problems for industrial customers and governments by being cheaper, better, and faster. Specifically, we look for companies that are:
Impactful: Demonstrable potential for significant, quantifiable GHG reduction and climate resilience within 20 years.
Feasible: Technology proven at TRL 3-4+ with a clear path to scalable, probable deployment and adoption driven by market pull.
Economic: Compelling unit economics, validated by robust techno-economic analysis, leveraging capital-efficient models and possessing global economic potential.
Formidable: Led by a committed team with the essential technical and commercial expertise.
We provide strategic and active partnership from the earliest stages of company formation, preferring to lead pre-seed and seed rounds. Our support is hands-on and focused on shortening market feedback cycles, ruthlessly prioritizing and delivering on milestones, and developing world class talent and organizations. We primarily invest in North American-based teams building companies with transformative technology and great execution.
